The path for the stones of the Via Flaminia had been cut through a narrow gorge between slopes of loose scree. Though the light was already fading, Julius guessed Crassus would keep the soldiers marching until the van reached clear ground wide enough for the first camp. One of the legions would have to move back onto the plains below for safety, which would leave the pass free except for the guards and extraordinarii who stayed on mounted patrol through darkness. No matter what happened, the legions could not be surprised by any enemy, a precaution they had learned more than a hundred years before, fighting Hannibal on the plains. Julius remembered Marius’s admiration for the old enemy. Yet even he had fallen in the end to Rome.

Though the land may once have been savage, now the wide capstones of the Via Flaminia cut through the mountains, with guard posts every twenty miles along its length. Villages had often sprung up around these as people gathered under the Roman shadow. Many found employment in maintaining the road and sometimes Julius saw small groups of laborers, on the grass verge, pleased to be idle for once.

At other times, Julius passed merchants forced off the road, who regarded the soldiers with a combination of anger and awe. They could not move toward Rome while the legions marched, and those that carried spoiling goods watched with dark expressions as they calculated the loss to come. The legionaries ignored them. They had built the trade arteries with their hands and backs and had first call on their use.

Julius wished Tubruk were with him. In his time, he had traveled the same route through the mountains and right across the vast plains in the north where Crassus hoped to engage the slave army. The estate manager would not have wanted another campaign, even if Julius could have spared him from the task of keeping Cornelia safe.

His mouth tightened unconsciously as he thought of the parting. It had been bitter, and though he’d hated having to leave with the anger still fresh between them, he could not delay joining Primigenia in the midst of the great host on the Campus Martius, standing ready to march north.

The memories of the last time he had left the city were still raw in him. Rome had burned on the horizon behind him as Sulla’s men hunted down the remnants of Primigenia. Julius grimaced as he marched. The legion lived, while Sulla’s poisoned flesh was reduced to ash.